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Not Pretty Enough By Jaimie Admans Review & Giveaway

New Year’s Resolutions:

Lloyd Layton will know I exist. He once said three whole words to me, so this is obviously progress. If I don’t get a proper conversation out of him soon, then I’ll take my top off and streak through the cafeteria, because nobody could fail to notice these boobs.

I will not get expelled for streaking through the cafeteria.

Those are the words that begin her mission.
Chessie is fourteen, not pretty enough, and very much in love. Lloyd Layton is hot, popular, and unaware of Chessie’s existence.
Her goal is clear: to get Lloyd to love her as much as she loves him, and she has exactly one year to do it.

As Chessie’s obsession with Lloyd reaches boiling point and she starts to spin a web of lies that spiral out of control, Lloyd turns out to be not quite the prince she thought he was. Can Chessie avoid the gathering storm before things go too far?

Fourteen year old Chessie realises her breasts are larger than most adult women, what she can't understand is how fellow student at Bach Afon Comprehensive School, and full time giant, Lloyd Layton, doesn't seem to notice that she or her breasts exist. Chessie feels a connection to Lloyd, she doesn't need to speak to him, but no doubt he understands how hard is it to fit in when you're different. But although tall beyond his years, Lloyd is popular, wealthy and simply gorgeous. This year is going to be different, Lloyd will finally notice the shy and accident prone Chessie, even if his mere presence brings out the clumsy, nervous, and downright embarrassing side of her. Luckily Chessie has best friends Ewan and Debs, that can see the humor in her madness.

Lloyd has only ever spoken to Chessie once prior, and those three meaningless words, she treasures. But the time has come to make that boy her own, and things seem to be off to a rocky start. Imagine during Algebra, you're crush sits next to you and doesn't understand what's going on. You've got the chance to impress him by showing your book smarts, clearly that will win him over... Unless you start sneezing, you just can't stop, then the killer blow? You sneeze all over his textbook. But in retrospect, that's still not the most embarrassing incident.

A new look is sure to have him notice you, but what if you're short on funds and hair dye can be so expensive these days. Food colouring should do the trick, and it just so happens that you have a bottle of red food dye in the pantry, it's three years out of date, but that shouldn't matter... Right? But it looks nothing as you expected, and turns your normally blonde locks, into a dirty pink colour. But the thing about food colouring? It doesn't wash out. What Chessie is left with, is a pink, dry knotted mess, to add insult to injury, she runs into Lloyd before she can rectify her follicles.

Friend Debs is convinced that Chessie and Lloyd have nothing in common, but Chessie won't hear of it. Lloyd Layton has become her obsession. In a series of disastrous blunders, Chessie can't believe that Lloyd still sees through her, walking into a lamppost and apologising, her allergic reaction to a new foundation, sawing through a table in her workshop class, only to topple over, flailing and looking for something to grab onto... She just never expected it to be Lloyd's crotch. But now it seems Lloyd may be noticing her, for all the wrong reasons.

She's now spent the better part of the school year, chasing after a boy that clearly doesn't want her... Or does he? It seems Lloyd isn't the picture of perfection that Chessie has painted him as, far from it, and Chessie learns that perhaps there may be more to life than having a boyfriend, a lesson that couldn't come soon enough.

Not Pretty Enough is absolutely hilarious! Chessie is obsessed with Lloyd, the boy that has it all. She believes that with her abnormally large breasts and his gigantic height, they could be a match made in heaven. Sadly, Chessie is too shy and decides to watch life from the sidelines. Lloyd brings out the worst in her, lying, scheming and falling over herself. It becomes painfully clear that Chessie is heading for self destruction, but it seems life will teach her a lesson that every teen has faced at one time or another.

I really enjoyed it, until the last few chapters. The fun and hilarity suddenly became too serious, too quickly and threw me for a loop. It was the difference between 3 ½ and 4 ½ stars.

Jaimie is a 28-year-old English-sounding Welsh girl with an awkward-to-spell name. She lives in South Wales and enjoys writing, gardening, drinking tea and watching horror movies. She hates spiders and cheese & onion crisps. She has been writing for years but has never before plucked up the courage to tell people.

I'm such a sucker for a pretty cover too. If you love quirky contemporaries, this will be perfect for your next read. How are you enjoying The Mortal Instruments series so far? I loved the first three novels in the series, and wish C.C had of left it at that.

Thank you so much for such a lovely review! I'm so glad you enjoyed the book! Sorry you thought the ending got too serious, I actually had never thought about that before! Thanks for being part of the tour, and for taking the time to write such a thoughtful review! :)

My pleasure. Thank you for allowing me the chance to read and review. It's been one of the funniest young adult books I've read in a long while. Your comedic scenes are among the best I've read, pee your pants funny. The ending was just a little too abrupt for me, but everything up until that point was absolutely brilliant.